About 10% of Americans suffer from chronic nerve pain due to peripheral neuropathy, a painful condition that most often happens in the limbs — often, the legs and feet.
While pain medication can help with some symptoms, medications can come with side effects, and they can also lose their effectiveness over time. Fortunately, nerve blocks can help.
As a top-rated peripheral neuropathy treatment center in Marietta, Georgia, US Neuropathy Centers offers comprehensive care for people with chronic nerve pain, including state-of-the-art injectable nerve blocks and peripheral nerve stimulation using a tiny implantable device.
If you’re suffering from nerve pain, here’s how these treatments could help.
Peripheral nerves include the nerves outside of your central nervous system (your brain and spinal cord), and they extend into every area of your body. Many people with peripheral neuropathy have symptoms affecting their feet and legs, including:
Peripheral neuropathy symptoms can vary in severity, and when they become chronic, they can interfere with normal activities, like walking and even sleeping.
The primary cause of peripheral neuropathy is nerve damage, which can be associated with an array of underlying causes, like:
Sometimes, nerve damage is permanent or even progressive. Other times, nerves heal once the underlying cause is addressed, but in the meantime, you can still have painful symptoms.
Most people with nerve pain respond well to treatment plans involving multiple therapies, including medication, physical therapy, and injections like nerve blocks.
In addition to relieving pain on their own, nerve blocks help decrease the need for pain medicines, while also making it easier to participate in physical therapy and other active forms of treatment.
Sometimes called neural blockades, nerve blocks work by blocking nerve signals between the brain and an area where pain is occurring. When those nerve pathways are blocked, your brain doesn’t receive signals that cause you to feel or sense pain in that area.
Injectable nerve blocks use a combination of anesthetic medication and anti-inflammatory agents to both eliminate symptoms and help correct inflammation that may be causing or contributing to pain.
At US Neuropathy Centers, we administer injections using imaging technology — most commonly, special X-rays that help us provide very precise amounts of medication for ultimate pain relief.
In peripheral nerve stimulation, the goal and effect are the same — eliminating painful nerve-related symptoms. But instead of using injections, peripheral nerve stimulation uses an implanted device that releases tiny electrical bursts. These energy bursts interfere with pain signaling, blocking the nerve pathway and preventing pain.
Both injections and nerve stimulation implantation are outpatient procedures, and you can resume most of your regular daily activities right away. If you have a peripheral nerve stimulation device implanted, we help you understand how to use the device to trigger pain relief when you need it.
Nerve blocks are a safe, effective way to manage chronic pain from peripheral neuropathy, but they’re not the only option for relieving nerve-related symptoms.
To learn more about nerve blocks and the other options we offer that can help you manage your symptoms, call us at 404-228-9892 or book an appointment online today with Stephen L. Barrett, DPM, Sequioa DuCasse, DPM, and our team at US Neuropathy Centers.
